There was a Reason
by peanut0565
Summary: PreHeroes.  Nathan was sent over for a simple peace keeping tour for the navy, ending in his plane crashing.  He comes to later to find himself in a hospital, five months later, with no idea what happened during the five months between then and before
1. Chapter 1

_**Author's Note: **__Totally a Nathan-centric story. Pre-Heroes. I own nothing you recognize. And if you happen to be reading 'Hunted in the Public's Eye' Sorry I need to take a break from that '_

_ENJOY!_

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After graduating from the academy, each student is required at least two years in service. As much as he would have wanted to avoid that, it was impossible. He'd have to go overseas. Though he was able to bid himself some time with marrying his long-time girlfriend, and going on a honeymoon in the caribbean. At least he'd have some fun memories and suggestive pictures of his young wife while sleeping in those cold hard barracks.

Maybe it would not be as bad as he thought. He was in fact a pilot, how much trouble could he get into flying over the terrain of those hostile third-world countries? Saying good bye was hard. Well... Saying good bye to certain individuals was hard. Heidi, by far was the hardest, seriously they had been married not even a month now, and he was being shipped off half way cross the world for a peace-keeping mission. Peter was the second, trailing not far behind his young wife. He was a senior in high school, and was as much as a rebel against their father as ever. He took it suprisingly well since they had finally cooled it with the fighting and were actually bonding during this time period. His parents were as any parents were, worried, but proud at the same time. His mother worried, His father was proud.

And with that he was off to spend the next year or two in a hostile foreign country. With no connection aside from letters between his loved ones.

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_8 months later..._

He was in a routine by now. Up by five am, tidy up his room, have a meager breakfast, and flying with hopes of returning that night to find letters from either Heidi or Peter. The only two who seemed to want to write to him, his parents were too busybut they wished him well, according to Peter.

He got out of his bunk with a yawn, swinging his feet over the edge of the bed and stretching. While getting dressed and his room cleaned in case of a suprise inspection by his superior, he caught glances at the pinboard on his desk, it was covered in the letters and pictures he had received recently. The most up-to-date on the home news was there, while the elder letters rested securely in the bottom drawer of his desk. Ready at any notice for him to re-read when he felt a little homesick.

After having breakfast he was off to his plane. He had been using the same one for the last four months, and the controls and gadgets were almost apart of himself now. It felt so natural for him to be in that cockpit. He even had two pictures taped into it, one of him and Heidi on their wedding day, and another of him and Peter...also on his wedding day.

"Petrelli!" Nathan stopped and turned around, finding his partner in crime, Alexander Raines. He smirked, The two only had been flying partners for a month now, but it was a great match. The two got along well, and seemed to be able to read each other without verbally expressing them when up in the air.

"Raines!" He called back, waiting for the younger man to catch up. "Ready for the sightseeing today?" Raines asked as he finally looked his arm around Nathans' neck from behind and starting to pull him into motion towards the two planes that they were using today.

"Of course." Nathan said, stealthfully pulling his arm around Alexs' neck, and quickly pulling him into a headlock. His flying partner was not only two years younger, but also an inch or two shorter than Nathan himself. It was easy for him to put Alex into a headlock, when horsing around before they had to take to the skies. Raines struggled, laughing, as Nathan ruffled his short dark brown hair a bit.

"Hey now." Alex cried while laughing. Nathan let go in good humor as they reached the first of the two planes. "Your chariot awaits you." Petrelli smirked, as he watched Alex move towards it. Nathan moved past it and went to his own plane.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary today.

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Soaring around in the sky was the ultimate high for Nathan. In the air he had nothing else to think about, only focusing on what he needed to do in the air. The speed of the plane, and the movements were so elegant, the whole pilot gig was such a perfect fit for him.

"Raines, Anything out of the ordinary over there?" He called through the radio that connected the two pilots together from their planes and to the base.

"Nah, Let's go home." Alex returned. They had been roaming around now, making their track flight to spot for anything suspicious, around their designated area. Nathan could agree with Alex's sentiment, wanting to return to the base now. Nothing was going on.

_Whistle. Crackle. Crunch._

"What was that?" Nathan asked, a note of worry hidden beneath his bewilderment as he felt his right wing give a little, causing a bit of turbulence. He regained balance of the plane for a second, long enough to peer outside the side window to see a smoking bullet hole in his plane. He eyed up Raines' plane and saw a bullet pierce his left wing.

"We're being shot at!" Raines screeched, trying to obtain control of his plane. The two shots were not solitary though, within seconds they heard more of the unsettling noises. Both planes were being shot at, and actually taking damage.

Nathan went into autopilot, punching and holding down the button that controlled the guns on his plane, firing in the direction he hoped the shots were being fired on. His partner began to do the same.

"We need to get out of here!" Nathan growled through the radio system over to Raines. Both planes beginning to take heavy damage.

As Nathan was about to jetison towards the base, and get there as quickly as he could handle, his engine catch fire, billowing smoke into his line of sight, making it impossible to see, impossible to correct his alinement , anything. He felt the whole metal contraption and himself starting to take a nose dive, one he knew he couldn't correct himself from.

"Shit!" He cried over the the radio, more for himself then anything else as he helplessly tried to fix the problem, but failing uselessly.

"I'm going down!" He growled as the smoke was blinding his vision so any attempt of softening the impact was nearly out of the question. All he could do was prepare himself for it.

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He snapped his eyes open in a panic taking in a deep breath. A breath of smoke instead of oxygen. He coughed and glanced around, the cockpit was at least ten times hotter then it had been, at this rate he'd burn alive. In a hasty move he quickly pulled himself from the seatbelts and slammed his hand into the top release button.

He cried in pain as the button was so hot that it left an angry burn in the center of his palm, and it didn't work either. He continued to cough, his eyes watering from the smoke as he basically stood up, thrusting his back into the glass in an attempt to open it.

The glass was intorably hot too, but at least he hit it hard enough with his back to pop it open. He fell out of the cockpit with his dwindling energy, lack of oxygen in his lungs, and the recent burns on his hand and back.

Nathan hit the ground and rolled away from the smoking plane. He gasped for the fresh cold air, taking it in with the idea that it might be taken away from him once again.

Once he regained some sense to look at his plane, the flames had engulped it. His eyes widened in shock, knowing full well it was going to blow soon. He scrambled to turn around and find somewhere to take cover. He sprinted as quickly as he could.

_Ka-Boom._

He cried in agony as he was blown face first into the ground. He felt a piece of metal lodge itself deeply into the back of his left thigh. Before he could even process the explosion in his mind, everything went black.


	2. Chapter 2

When he did come around he found himself on his back, on a piece of fabric. He opened his eyes and glanced around to find himself strapped down to an army made stretcher, which consisted of a green cloth tied to two sticks. There were three straps around his body, one for chest and elbows, one for hands and waist, and the last for his legs. They secured him to the lousy stretcher, and wool blanket was over him for warmth probably. It did little good, Nathan thought, as he felt himself shivering, from both the agony localized in his leg, and the snowy climate of the foreign land.

He looked up to the man carrying the end of the stretcher where his head was. The soldier was fully dressed for these wintery conditions, and the blue helmet signified that he was a UN soldier. Nathan lifted his head with a bit of effort, to see a similar appearance from the other soldier. It was then that the other one noticed he was awake and looked down to Nathan.

"We are almost at the base, just don't try to move." He ordered Nathan, who nodded softly and just continued to rest his head on the fabric beneath him as the troop ambled along, closing his eyes along with the movement.

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The next time he came to, he found himself in a mess of cords and the definite scent of sterile-ness, as well as a definite lack of the pain of before. He opened his eyes an inch, only to close them again after being assaulted by a deadly bright light. he turned his head away, blinking a few times before adjusting to the flourescent light.

"Lt. Petrelli" He heard his name, as he found the one who spoke it. It was the medical doctor from the base he was stationed at. He nodded shortly in response. He couldn't believe how tired he felt. The fatigue seemed to have taken the place of everything else. He closed his eyes again, before the doctor could continue.

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"Nathan?" He heard his father's voice. He opened his eyes an inch to meet the stoic expression of his father towering over his bed.

"How long...has it been?" He heard himself speak, he felt it, but some how the voice didn't sound like his. It was hoarse, quiet, and void of any human characteristics.

"4 weeks, Nathan." Arthur answered. Four weeks since when? Since he crashed...since he was here. Where ever here was? Nathan never liked confusion much.

"Since when?" He asked. He was still disgusted at how unhuman his voice sounded, how raw and hoarse it was. Could it even be counted as a voice?

"Since they found you in the POW camp." His father answered, still sporting the stone-faced expression. POW camp? Nathan didn't remember any camp, of any sort. His expression must have been clear confusion, as his father continued to explain.

"Your plane went down 4 months ago, they told us you were MIA after finding the wreckage and not finding a body or anything near by... Four weeks ago they had an operation to take down an unoffical POW camp, and found you among the other soldiers who were barely alive." There were very few times that Nathan was grateful that his father too was in the military, and this was one of those few times.

Though now there was a whole new situation of unsettling news. He had a five month memory gap apparently. The last thing he did remember was running from the plane which was about to explode...then nothing.

Nathan lifted his head with great effort and saw his chest was covered in bandages, as well as his arms. From the neck down he was basically a mummy. His left leg was in a thick cast which was levated. After a moment longer he let the back of his head reach the pillow once again, exhausted from the effort.

"Last thing I remember...was the plane exploding..." He looked to his father tiredly. Arthur then placed a hand on Nathans' shoulder, squeezing it gently with comfort and sighed.

"It will come back..." He said quietly. "Now you should rest, your mother and Peter have been beside themselves, and anxious to see you. They'll be here in a few hours." Another clue. They weren't at a hospital near home. The first location that came to mind was a hospital in Germany, where they often placed wounded soldiers who weren't quite ready to make the trip over the ocean back to the states. A middle ground between the hostile terraitory and the homeland.


End file.
